The Dramatic Effectiveness of Act 3 Scene 4 - The Banquet Scene

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Introduction

The Dramatic Effectiveness of Act 3 Scene 4 The Banquet Scene Dramatic effectiveness is the writer's use of technique in their writing in order for the audience watching a production to have a greater experience through occurrences on the stage. Through dramatic effectiveness a writer can create brilliant atmosphere and depth to their work. This dramatic effectiveness is thickly portrayed in the play Macbeth where Shakespeare uses the technique skilfully in order to create extremely tense and frustrating scenes for the audience, which heightens the atmosphere for the viewer. Act 3 Scene 4 starts extremely tensely and the audience is immediately thrown into the drama and excitement. Macbeth holds a banquet in celebration of his coronation as King of Scotland. Macbeth is polite to his guests and is very cool, in this way he deceives them and hides the wickedness he broods as he welcomes them humbly, 'You know your own degrees, sit down; at first and last, the hearty welcome' withholding from them the truth about Banquo's disappearance and his absence from the banquet. ...read more.

Middle

It is Macbeth's apparent good spirit to want Banquo to attend the banquet, yet in reality the audience knows that this is purely to cover up his dirty deed, which makes this so satirical. Macbeth's fear is seen as he becomes hysterical and panic stricken as the ghost of Banquo mystically appears and sits in his seat. He then speaks to the ghost, 'Thou canst not say I did it; never shake Thy gory locks at me!' Macbeth has already seen a dagger earlier in the play, he know believes he sees the ghost. Why he sees the ghost is a result of his guilt and remorse for what he has done. All these emotions have been brewing inside him and are released in the form of Banquo's ghost. In the theatre it is difficult to portray emotions such as guilt, as strongly as was needed in Macbeth. As a result Shakespeare uses the ghost as a second medium so that it is easy for the audience to feel this emotion and experience his fear and guilt. ...read more.

Conclusion

Let the earth hide thee! Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold; Thou hast no speculation in those eyes Which thou dost glare with.' Lady Macbeth tries to cover up her husband assuring the Lord's that there is nothing to fear, 'Think of this, good peers, But as a thing of custom. 'Tis no other, Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.' Lady Macbeth realises that the situation is only worsening so beckons the Lord's to leave. The atmosphere cools as the tension is calmed by the Lords departure from the stage. This signals the end of this tense scene leaving Macbeth and Lady Macbeth frightened and panicked. This scene is one of the most tense in the entire play due to the techniques used by the writer, his uses of imagery, imagination and his creativity. The use of mediums such as the ghost of Banquo to get across the characters deepest expressions is a good method of harnessing the fear and anxiety in an atmosphere and this makes this scene so tense and exciting. Duncan Spalding ...read more.

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